Orbital Occultism
by UnmovingGreatLibrary
Summary: The Sealing Club manages to afford a short trip to an orbital hotel, the perfect spot for a date and a rare opportunity to perform occult investigations in space. When Renko starts prioritizing research over romance, though, Maribel decides to take matters into her own hands.


"Check it out, Merry."

Renko launched off of the wall. As she floated down the hallway, she swung her duffel bag overhead, pulling herself into a spin. Once she was in motion, she tugged it in against her chest, leaving her spinning like a bullet as she flew through the air.

Maribel watched the performance with a smile, but didn't let it tempt her away from the handles lining the walls. She tugged on one, pulling herself along, then a pointed yank to stop her body from swinging around to smack into the wall. "I didn't know you were so acrobatic, Renko."

"It's just physics. Once you learn to think in free-body diagrams, it's all pretty simple." Renko rebounded off one of the padded walls, adjusted her course with a shove off the ceiling, and continued floating ahead. "Room eighteen, right?"

"That's right."

A few more meters down the hall, Renko grabbed a handle and swung her bag around to brake herself. She came to a stop in front of a door, stenciled '18' in the middle, and fumbled to wave a keycard in front of the sensor. The door slid open with a hiss.

"It's a bit more luxurious than it looked in the pictures..." Renko sounded disappointed, but shoved herself forward, floating along into the room.

When Maribel thought about it, it didn't seem quite fair for Renko to be so accustomed to weightlessness. Back when they'd investigated the TORIFUNE, she'd visited it alone once or twice before she brought Renko along. And yet, here she was, swinging between handholds like her life depended on them, while Renko bounced around like a veteran cosmonaut.

She still reached the room before the door closed, hefting her own bag forward and then floating along after it. 'Cheap' was a very relative thing when it came to orbital hotels, but they'd gotten the cheapest room in the place, and on sale at that. It kind of showed. The room was a single cylinder, maybe three meters wide and four long. Machinery hummed behind the walls, and they were studded with handholds, lights, a single holographic projector, and straps to hold smaller items. Only a few features distinguished it—sleeping pads attached to the wall on one side, a pedestal with a small potted plant and a few power outlets, and a tiny station for hygiene in between the two. On the far wall, on one of the flat sides of the cylinder, was a little porthole showing the Earth below.

"Can you really call this 'luxurious'...?" Maribel asked, grabbing another handle to stop herself.

"Well, if you think about it compared to the old space stations, it is. We aren't surrounded by equipment and experiments on every side." Renko had already ditched her bag and was reclined in the air, leafing through a pamphlet. "... huh, I didn't know they had a botanical garden up here."

"They do!" Maribel released her bag and floated over to Renko, then tugged on a handle to slide in alongside her. "It isn't much bigger than this room, but they say the flowers grow larger in zero gravity. It should be fun!"

"Technically it's microgravity."

Maribel ignored the correction. Years of exposure to Renko had given her a pretty thick skin where pedantry was involved. " _And_ they've started brewing their own drinks up here. Drinking and moonwatching sounds even more romantic if we're closer to the moon, doesn't it?"

"Microgravity microbrews, huh?" Renko folded the pamphlet shut and gave Maribel a reproachful tap on the nose. "But remember that we only have a day and a half up here, and we spent an entire year of club budget on the trip. We can't spend the whole time relaxing."

"You promised me that we'd do something romantic up here, too." Maribel poked Renko's nose in retaliation. "... besides, it's going to take me an hour or two just to calm down after that trip. I think I'll go down to the cafe and get a snack before I settle in."

"Sure thing. It will take a while to get all the experiments set up, anyway." Renko floated open to her bag and undid two clasps, then tossed a flap open. The bag had been nearly filled to bursting, and now, experimental detritus floated out—two small plants in transparent capsules, a plastic baggy full of something green and softly glowing, a handheld EMF reader, a plastic terrarium the size of a mug, a stack of papers that Renko had already filled out with spaces for recording measurements and observations.

Maribel eyed this pile of seemingly random objects. "What's the terrarium for? I don't remember planning any experiments like that."

"Oh, I thought of that last night. I actually had to find a 24-hour store to buy it. There's a beetle in there. I thought I'd observe it and see if it develops any changes, like those chimera things from the TORIFUNE."

"Right... Well, um, I'll be back in a bit. Would you like me to bring you anything from the cafe?"

Renko was already leafing through her stack of instructions, with the EMF meter in her other hand. "Hmm?" she mumbled, distractedly. "Oh, no, I'm fine. Thank you, though."

Maribel lingered for a moment, but Renko was too wrapped up in her work to notice. With a sigh, she ducked through the door and floated into the hallway.

* * *

"Renko," Maribel said, as she floated back into the room. "Did you know that Satellite Iced Coffee went out of vogue last year? The popular thing now is bubble tea."

In the time Maribel had been gone, Renko had transformed the room into her own science lab. Half a dozen experiments were tethered to the walls, and she floated in a cloud of papers near the window. She was jotting observations on one, and didn't look up as she said, "Is that so?"

"Mmhm. Without any gravity, the density of the ingredients doesn't matter. They can make the bubbles out of whatever they want, and they still end up distributed all through the drink. The menu covers a whole wall."

"I'll have to try some later." Renko looked up with a smile, a moment too late, as Maribel floated over and lightly tackled her stomach. They rebounded off the padded wall and floated back toward the doorway. "... did you really get that lonely while you were gone?"

"Well, it's only logical, isn't it? There are only a few dozen people up here. If you think about it like that, we're practically on a desert island."

"A desert island that gets transportation shuttles three times a week." Renko returned the hug as well as she could, then released Maribel, letting them slowly float apart until they could speak face-to-face again. "Are you ready to get started on the experiments?"

"I've planned a schedule for it, actually! We can do experiments until it's time for dinner. After dinner, we'll take a break and relax together. Around six-thirty, there's a sunset while we're over the Persian Gulf. It's supposed to be one of the best views during our whole visit."

"You really did your research, huh?"

"You planned all the experiments, so I had to do _something_." Maribel gently pushed off the wall and floated over to Renko's cloud of experimental detritus. "Now, let's get to work so we don't miss our opportunity."

* * *

Dinnertime came. Dinnertime went.

Maribel surreptitiously pulled her phone out and checked the time. It was a bit after seven. At orbital speeds, half an hour was enough to leave the Persian Gulf almost literally a world away.

She looked up from her phone, and realized that she hadn't needed to be subtle about checking it. Renko was wrapped up in the work, currently maneuvering equipment around the bag full of slime and mumbling into her own phone. "Experiment nineteen: electrical stimulation of ectoplasm in microgravity. The ectoplasm in question was gathered from a gravestone near a known entrance to the Netherworld, using standard parabiological containment protocols. It's remained stable in storage for—"

Maribel softly cleared her throat. "Oh, um. Before we get too wrapped up in the next experiment, maybe we should get dinner?"

"Hmm?" Renko looked up, seeming dazed for a moment as she remembered the existence of the outside world. She glanced out the window to check the time, and winced. "Ah, sorry. Guess we missed our opportunity, huh?"

"By a few thousand miles."

Renko rubbed guiltily at the back of her neck. "The experiments are taking longer than I'd expected, so I'd be lying if I said we could be done in time for the next sunset. Uh. I'll tell you what. I can do all of these ectoplasm ones by myself. Why don't you go have dinner, and we'll plan on doing all of our couple things tomorrow?"

"Right..." Maribel couldn't hide the disappointment in her voice, but she tried. She gave Renko a peck on the cheek before pushing off the wall to float toward the door.

* * *

Maribel ate a luxurious dinner, with caramel apple bubble tea for dessert.

When she returned, she helped Renko with their experiments for another few hours—taking electromagnetic readings of the beetle to check it for paranormal mutations, comparing Renko's star-based calculations of their position to the station's official records, attempting to observe unnatural boundaries that might hint at the presence of a trans-lunar hidden civilization. When she strapped herself in to sleep, the station's official time was 12:10 AM, and Renko was still doing experiments.

When she woke up, seven and a half hours later, Renko was... still doing experiments.

"Have you slept?" Maribel asked.

"I slept enough. And I, uh." Renko paused to yawn. "I grabbed breakfast and a coffee from the cafe. Sorry. I would have waited up, but I thought you might like to linger over breakfast."

"Today's supposed to be our day for relaxing together, though."

"Yeah, sorry. I ended up behind schedule. I accidentally contaminated one of the plant control groups last night, so I had to spend a while figuring out how to account for that. I also realized that we hadn't recreated all of the conditions from the TORIFUNE in the beetle experiment, either, and it took a few hours to fix that."

"All of the conditions...? How are we supposed to recreate a whole research satellite up here?"

"Well, er. I made a little shrine to Ame-no-Torifune out of toothpicks. I thought that might be important."

"I see..." Maribel floated over, and gently braked herself against the wall. She was starting to get the hang of this zero-g thing, at least well enough to move with a little elegance. She took Renko's hand and gave it a squeeze. "Renko, I know the experiments are important to you, but, um, I _would_ like to spend some time together while we're up here, okay? Some time together that isn't measuring beetles."

"We will, I promise. I just need another hour or two, okay? Then I'm all yours."

Breakfast—crepes, with a synthetic blueberry compote that was especially thick to keep it from floating off into the air—made Maribel feel better about the whole situation. Talking about her feelings earnestly and openly. That had probably been the key.

Two hours later, though, Renko was still in the middle of an experiment.

Maribel realized that she needed a plan.

* * *

"Reeeenko."

Maribel floated back into the room. She'd taken a short trip to the station's tiny shopping area, and had only barely managed not to return empty-handed. Shipping to space was no longer reserved for the incredibly wealthy, but it was still expensive, and the prices up here reflected that. Most of the shop's contents were souvenirs, for that rare class of person who had 4500 yen to throw away on a tacky fridge magnet. The rest, though, were luxury goods. It had taken a lot of consideration, but she'd managed to find a single bottle of perfume that she could afford, if only barely. It would mean scrimping on sweets and coffee for the next few months, but all progress came at a cost.

She didn't waste any time. She slipped up behind Renko and pressed in against her back, at just the right angle to accentuate her figure. "Reeenkoooo," she repeated, leaning forward to let her breath wash across the back of Renko's ear.

"Hmm? It isn't lunch time yet, is it?"

Maribel tried not to let the lackluster response dishearten her too quickly. She slipped her arms around Renko's waist and pulled herself in to plant a kiss behind Renko's ear. "Not at all. You've been working for a few hours, though. I was just thinking, I'm sure the experiments will be okay if—" a pause to give Renko's tummy a suggestive stroke, and press another kiss to the side of her head "—you take a break to spend a little time with me, won't they?"

"This one's actually going to have me tied up for a bit. It's the dowsing crystal one, so I'll need to keep a close eye on it for the next half-hour or so."

"A-ah. Um." Maribel paused. Her voice was shaking, and she was blushing so hard that she felt like her cheeks might catch fire. Being seductive was harder than it sounded. "Are you sure? I just thought that maybe we could spend some..." She doubled down, pulling herself against Renko's back so tightly that they started drifting in the air, nibbling on her ear. "... quality time together."

"That does sound nice, but I just set it up, and it takes about twenty minutes to get it ready." Renko shot back an apologetic, but distracted, smile. "Sorry."

"It's... it's fine." Maribel released her death grip on Renko's waist, allowing herself to drift backward. "Maybe later, then."

"Mmhm."

It was time for plan B.

* * *

"Hmm." Maribel had managed to pace herself to float into the room backward, at a leisurely pace. "Renko, did you know that this station is the first one to sell layer cake in zero gravity?"

"Mmh?" Renko's hands were still full with the dowsing experiment. The crystal floated at a carefully neutral position in front of her, drifting very slowly in the room's air currents. She held its cord one hand, while the other slowly passed various objects near it. She didn't look up from her work, but Maribel was getting used to that.

"Apparently the key is to have little ribbons of praline holding all the layers together, and use a richer dough so it doesn't make crumbs. Isn't human ingenuity great?"

"Are you sure you don't just love anything that lets you eat strawberry cake?"

"That too." Maribel floated right up against the wall in front of Renko, with the porthole hidden behind her. Renko couldn't possibly ignore her now. She slowly cut off a big bite of the cake, watching Renko's face for any sign that she was noticing it. Renko didn't budge, but she wasn't going to give up that easily. "Would you like a bite?" Not that she was going to take no for an answer. She was already holding the chunk of cake so close to Renko's face that it threatened to go up her nose if anybody made a wrong move.

"It doesn't really look like I get a say in the matter." Renko finished with her current experimental pass—waving one of her shoes back and forth beneath the pendulum—then leaned forward to scoop the bite of cake up in her mouth.

"It's really good, isn't it? I think the dough is rice-based. It gives it sort of a rich sweetness."

"Mmhm."

"I might say that it's one of the best cakes I've had in my life."

"You'd be the expert."

"'Cake expert,' huh? I like the sound of that." Maribel cut off another, smaller bite of cake. She raised it toward her mouth, then paused theatrically. "Oh! I'm so sorry, Renko. I was so excited about it that I only got a slice for myself. That was selfish of me."

"I'm sure that I'll live, somehow."

"I don't want to be rude, though. How about this? We'll go out to the cafe and I'll buy you your own slice. It's probably about time for you to take a break anyway, isn't it?" Maribel couldn't keep a hint of hope out of her voice.

"Ah, it's fine." Renko turned to jot some observations down on an experimental form. "I've been trying to watch my weight anyway. I'll save some calories for dinner."

Maribel kept watching Renko's face for any sign of wavering... but Renko was already focused on the experiments again. Pouting, she took another bite of her cake... and pulled her phone out to check the time. She had barely seven hours left before their shuttle back to Earth.

Seduction had failed. Food had failed. She hadn't wanted to play dirty, but it was time to appeal to Renko's higher drives.

* * *

This time, Merry was away for longer.

There was research to do. She needed to install the station's guest app on her phone, followed by forty-five minutes of tracking down stock footage. She needed to rehearse her approach in her head, because this time, improvisation wasn't an option.

When she entered the room again, she was loaded for bear.

"Renko! Renko!" Trying to look as panicked as possible, Maribel launched herself into the room. This turned out to be a mistake, since she rebounded off the wall before she could grab onto a handhold. "The station! I, um…!"

She was off to a good start. Renko looked up from recording a long list of observations. "What happened?"

"I think it, um. I think it might be haunted?"

"Haunted?" Renko glanced around the room, like she was expecting to see a spectre floating right there over the entry hatch. "… what makes you say that?"

"I've heard sounds and… and seen things. There's definitely something here!"

"Could it have been your boundary powers acting up again?"

"It feels, um, different? Anyway, we should go investigate before it esca—"

A low, shuddering groan filled the air around them, drowning out the end of Maribel's sentence. A sharp scratching noise, like nails on metal, followed after it.

The sounds faded. Renko stared thoughtfully at the wall. "... oh. I see."

"Right! Isn't it exciting, though? Nobody's ever reported a ghost in space before. We should search the whole station and see what we can find!"

"Well, I wouldn't say that _nobody_ has reported them. There's an old theory that the magnetosphere might save imprints of people's—"

This time, Renko was the one who got interrupted. The room's lights flickered, off and on a few times, before shuddering away into darkness. Another low groan shook the room, rattling the hatch in its frame.

"Did you hear that?!" Maribel squeaked. "It's probably noticed us! We should hurry!"

The lights flickered on again, just long enough for her to see Renko staring analytically at her. When the darkness returned, ragged lines were counting out phantasmal tallies on every surface. Near the door, a single command glowed, in sickly green, dripping letters: _LEAVE THIS PLACE_.

"Isn't this amazing, Renko? I don't think we've ever seen an apparition like this before! Do you think the station passed through a barrier to the spirit world or something?!"

In the dim light, Maribel could just barely make out Renko floating across the room toward her. She came to a stop, one hand resting on Maribel's shoulder.

"A-ah? I promise I'm safe, Renko! But we should really go investigate, don't you—"

Renko's other hand reached behind Maribel's back and gently tugged on her wrist, pulling it into view.

Maribel went silent.

There, on the phone she'd been hiding behind her back, was the entire truth of the 'haunting'—her phone, with a long list of commands for the room's environmental controls: _LIGHTS OFF, 0.2s, LIGHTS ON, 0.2s, LIGHTS OFF 0.2s, PLAY TRACK: ghost_groan_04 VOLUME 85%_

Renko stared down at this.

Maribel stared at it too. "... ah. Um. Maybe my phone is haunted?"

"Well," Renko said dryly, "if the ghost is so lazy that it uses an app to make its spooky groaning noises, we probably don't need to worry about it too much."

"Ehe. You're probably right."

The two floated in awkward silence for several seconds, until Maribel sheepishly hit the button to cancel her ongoing presentation. The lights turned back on, and the holographic projector flickered off, making the many glowing marks around the room vanish.

"… sorry," Maribel said.

The awkward silence continued.

Renko broke it first. She let out a long sigh and shook her head. "I should probably be the one saying that."

"Well, really... I'm not sure that 'let's make spooky sounds to convince Renko that the space station is haunted' was my proudest moment."

"Merry." Renko pushed off the wall. She floated over in front of Maribel, then hooked an arm around her waist to keep the two together. "I spent so long ignoring you that you felt like you needed to fake a ghost attack to get my attention. That isn't a great look for me either, you know?"

"Well, no, but—"

Maribel didn't get any farther. Renko tightened her grip, pulling the two closer, and pushed into a firm kiss. Maribel gave a muffled squeak of surprise, but melted into it, rested her hands on Renko's hips in return. The force of their motions had sent them floating across the room, slowly spinning. Neither of them seemed the slightest bit concerned.

When Renko broke the kiss, she had a tired smile on her lips. "… even if it _is_ a little cute how far you'll go for some attention."

Maribel pouted. "It isn't cute!"

"Sorry to break it to you, but it's definitely cute. … although I guess if I'm going to appreciate it, I should actually give you attention. Especially when we agreed this trip would be a couple thing..." Renko glanced guiltily toward her experiments, then back. "None of the experiments I have left are important anyway. I'm pretty sure the world can go another day without learning whether or not ouija boards produce different results in microgravity."

"Um. Did we _bring_ a ouija board?"

"… I was going to draw one on paper and make a planchette out of a bar of soap or something." Renko cleared her throat, hurriedly changing the subject. She interlaced her fingers with Maribel's and gave both hands a squeeze. "The point is, this concludes the official club activities for this trip. We can spend the rest of it together."

"Visiting the botanical garden?"

"We can visit the garden, yes."

"Moon-watching?"

"There's supposed to be a good window for it in two hours, I think."

"… drinking bubble tea and eating cake?"

Renko glanced down at herself. "I… suppose my waistline won't mind a _few_ extra calories."

"Wonderful. … oh, but Renko, there's one problem."

"Hmm? What's that?"

Keeping one hand on Renko for stability, Maribel drew her feet up. Then, she pushed off of Renko's tummy. Maribel shot straight toward the door, while Renko bounced off the wall behind her, blinking in confusion.

"… I had a lot of chances to practice moving in zero-g while you were studying. I'm afraid you're a rusty old lady by comparison."

The door opened in front of Maribel. She floated through it, and managed to tug it closed just in time to hear Renko thud against its padded interior.

Maribel braced her feet against the far wall and wedged herself up against the door, bucking a few times as Renko shoved against it. "Oh no, Renko! The door is stuck! Maybe it's the ghost again?"

The door bounced a few more times in response. Renko said something, but her voice was muffled by the bulkhead between them.

"Keep pushing, Renko. If anybody can defeat a ghost, it's you!"

She stayed in position for another few seconds, stifling a giggle as Renko kept fighting against her. Finally, between shoves, she darted aside. Renko tackled the door again, and this time, nothing resisted her. She floated out into the hallway, careening off the far wall, then ricocheted a few times before she drifted to a near-stop.

She shot Maribel a Look. Maribel only snickered in response.

"It's only fair for me to get a _little_ revenge, isn't it?" Maribel floated over and hooked a finger into the collar of Renko's jumpsuit, pulling the two together for a quick kiss. "Now come on. We have cake to eat and zero-g cuddling to experiment with."


End file.
